The Rock 'n Rose Spring Tour 2013:

Getting an early start in Wisconsin

That's me, breaking the cherry of public readings for my first book, "A Rose by any Other Name: An Alphabet of Tales about a Man and a Woman." The first appearance was Saturday, February 16th at Driftless Books, housed in a very old tobacco building in Viroqua, WI.

I read four tales, "Kat & Kismet," "Last Paige," "Zora, the Last Girl," and "Mustang Sally." As this was, in essence a Valentine's Day promotion, I featured more of the sweet or positive tales than what I would normally pick to read- Paige being the only story that gets into the ugly ... and stays there.

That same night, I wound up doing an impromptu reading at a house party with a Lupercalia theme to it. I would have only read one of my favorites - and one of the darkest tales in the entire collection - "The Cross of Lorraine," but I got an offer I couldn't refuse from Kristin to also read, "Mustang Sally," too. Sally, which is dedicated to my grandpa, Izzy Hecht, tends to be peoples' favorites, so I've included it in all my readings. The  room featuring the entertainment was packed with over forty people, so that energy felt great, getting laughs in places intended.

The previous weekend I had read "Sally" along with "Paige," "Lorraine," and "Olive and He whose Name She Shall Never Mention" on the SoundWaves radio program on WDRT.

Wanting to change things up on Sunday, the 17th at Pearl Street Books in LaCrosse, WI, I was going to flip the ratio of nice to not-so-nice, but finally settled on alternating tales, reading, "Paige," "Zora," "Nina, a Pinto and the Santa Ana Winds," before closing with "Sally."

Kristin shot some video along with the stills seen on this page and she and I will trying to figure out how to get a few of the highlights from the weekend's appearances up on here or on the IndieGoGo campaign which  has just over a month left to meet its goal. Right now, that goal seems awfully far away, but it really is great and exciting to get out in front of an audience and to share my stories from off the page and out of the book.

I'll add another of the YouTube videos of me reading a short story on this blog -- and on the Rock 'n Rose Spring Tour 2013 IndieGoGo campaign later this week.

Thanks and ... go read a book ... preferably mine.

Brian